can a DMF seperate??

[GRU]

i it possible for the DMF to completely uncouple the motor from the trans? or does it just get noisy and vibrate when it goes? reason im asking is i may have to make a 600 mile trip towing about 11,000#s and i know my flywheel is loose. if it can physically separate and leave me with absolutely no way to park it on a hill (e brake wont hold ****) then i wont take it. just need to know what can happen. right now it just clangs around a bit when idling in neutral.

 

[RyanDamo]

people have shot pieces of it through the bellhousing with powerstrokes after they fail

 

[bigblue85]

alot of them just vibrate like no other when you shut them off...mine does it everynow and then when it idles for a while but its got 300000 miles on her so i dont blame it ha ha

 

[The Warden]

As I understand it, they can and do fail completely...to the point where the engine and transmission will be completely detached from one another. IIRC that was what necessitated Jim Williams to perform the field repair that has since come to be known as the Lucky Mod.

Without knowing how loose yours is, I would STRONGLY recommend addressing the issue before you hit the road with 11K hitched to your 6K truck...the Lucky Mod is one option, or replace it with an SMF conversion kit.

Just my $.02...good luck!

 

[lotzagoodstuff]

At the very least, you should climb under your truck and have a look at the play in the DMF and the springs. If you see the springs bulging out of their compartments, or you have excessive movement in the DMF (I think the acceptable play is around 1/2" maybe?) at least you'll know what kind of fire your playing with.

Good luck either way.

 

[MUDKICKR]

i bought a truck for cheap when the guy told me the transmission was bad. i checked it out and the flywheel had came apart. nothing was wrong with the tranny for the trk, just the flywheel gave up. makes for a fun truck when on a hill and the e-brake dont work.

 

[Agnem]

They will make that noise for a pretty long time. I put up with it in the Lady Moose the first couple years we had her. She pulled the camper all the way to Michigan and back like that, and when I did the lucky mod, the DMF was still very much intact. I think you would be OK for 600 miles, but if you can find a spare DMF to take with you just in case, that would be wise. Either that, or find the time to lucky mod it.

 

[Cincinnati Guy]

the dually?

 

[jonathan]

the dually?

yes the red dually

 

[MUDKICKR]

i guess no one sells a kit to rebuild the dmf?

 

[Agnem]

That's correct. Because no one would WANT to rebuild a DMF. There is probably close to 100 parts in that stinkin' thing.

 

[GRU]

no ryan not the dually my blue truck. i guess i neglected to mention i sold the dually back in october. shouldnt have though... anyhow theres a long story to go with it buy basically thats what this trip is for. a guys trading me his 92 north carolina dually for a bodywork job. so i sold yours. ok maybe not such a long story... anyhow i dont want to put a clutch and flywheel in it because im putting the auto in my new dually in my blue truck.

 

[RLDSL]

Yes it can fail completely. You have two mutually exclusive failure modes on these things. On is the most common where the springs and holders give out and spit out, generally makes a lot of noise , but the clutch will usually hold, and then there's the elusive overload protection section hidden in the center that is basically a safety clutch built into the flywheel. This little ditty is designed to fail in the event of overload, exactly why is uncertain, but assumption is to possibly protect the ZF tranny which isn't the strongest thing on earth. If you use a stock organic clutch, and don't pull real heavy, chances are , you will never trigger this thing off, but if you mount a heavy duty clutch in the thing, the overload protection device, becomes teh weak link and will slip before the clutch will, and once that sucker has slipped one time, the flywheel is toast.
I found this out the hard way. IT particularly does not take kindly to getting heated up.

there are a number of very good reasons that so many of us have gone to various versions of solid flywheels getting stranded is one of them

 

[65sixbanger]

Weld it and make a SMF haha

I did

 

[GRU]

i thought about welding it and stuff. i had my heart set on swapping it for an E4OD. however after pondering it extensively (couldnt sleep...) i decided ive put way too much effort into swapping in the np205 and stuff. i hate the hard clutch pedal not neccessarily the shifting. so im just going to get a SMF kit and be done in an afternoon.